Overview of SAP Cloud ALM for SAP S/4HANA

[Daniel_Enderli]

Introduction

SAP Cloud ALM (CALM) is the new ALM solution from SAP. A cloud product developed on the SAP Business Technology Platform (BTP) for the use of Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) for hybrid SAP solutions (On Premise / Cloud).

In this blog post, I would like to provide a summary overview of what SAP Cloud ALM is, what it consists of and what it is preferably used for. The blog post is based on personal experiences with the product, application in practice and the knowledge sources provided by SAP.

 

What is SAP Cloud ALM

• Ready to use within 15 minutes after provisioning


• Very easy to use in the basic functionalities


• Always up to date, as content is updated in real time


• State-of-the-art cloud technology / cloud-native


• Based on the SAP Business Technology Platform (BTP)


• State of the art user experience


• Engineered for the Intelligent Enterprise


• Open APIs


• Very cost efficient

What is SAP Cloud ALM not

• Not a solution that can be customized down to the last detail


• No solution for customer-specific characteristics


• No 1:1 replica of the SAP Solution Manager

SAP Cloud ALM Big Picture

I use the following illustration to give a rough overview of SAP Cloud ALM. The most important features and keywords of SAP Cloud ALM are:

• Cloud-native and open


• For the intelligent enterprise


• In the public cloud


• Speed


• Daily deployments


• Biweekly feature releases

 

The KISSS principle

SAP Cloud ALM follows the KISS principle (to strive for the simplest possible solution to a problem), whereby I take the liberty of adding the principle to the KISSS principle: "Keep it simple, short and standard" 🙂

Features of SAP Cloud ALM

SAP Cloud ALM offers a wide range of functionalities for the three areas:

• SAP Cloud ALM for implementation (projects such as new implementation, upgrade, further development)


• SAP Cloud ALM for Operation (operation of SAP solutions)


• SAP Cloud ALM for Services (service business model)

 

SAP Activate and SAP Cloud ALM

The SAP Activate methodology is a fixed part in SAP Cloud ALM. For implementation projects, a ready-made template based on SAP Activate can be selected.

SAP Cloud ALM provides tools and accelerators for each phase of SAP Activate:

• Onboarding


• Design of the solution


• Build the solution


• Testing the solution


• Deploy the transports/deployments


• Innovate of new functionalities

When creating a new project in SAP Cloud ALM, the appropriate methodology and system landscape with a template including tasks can be selected.

 

API's and openness

A big advantage of SAP Cloud ALM is the openness for the connection of SAP solutions and third-party tools, which takes place via API's.

With the API Hub, SAP offers ready-made APIs that can be used immediately.

Many other APIs and interfaces for all three areas are being planned and will enable direct connection and connection to the various functionalities in the future. The following image gives a good overview of this:

SAP Cloud ALM and RISE with SAP

In the context of "RISE with SAP", SAP Cloud ALM can be classified as a standardized tool and resource that supports the entire transformation from the start to finish, with one central source which can integrate other tools.

And by the way: SAP Cloud ALM is included in RISE with SAP for free!

Quintessence

There is much more to write about SAP Cloud ALM, but I would like to stick to the KISSS principle myself at this point. Therefore, I summarize my assessment and experiences in two sentences.

SAP Cloud ALM: "The little prince is growing up and has a great future ahead of him as the future king. Sooner or later, SAP customers will have to deal with SAP Cloud ALM."